


Here By My Side

by Green



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Backstory, Character Study, Childhood, Gen, Guns, Soldiers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-03-06
Updated: 2006-03-06
Packaged: 2017-11-27 08:10:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/659753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Green/pseuds/Green
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>You are destruction</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Here By My Side

John’s first gun had pellets and not bullets, and you had to pump it up fifteen times before every shot. It was bought specifically by his parents so he could learn safety and patience, and his father put up paper targets on the side of a tree for John to work with.

After he mastered the little paper bull’s eye, his father hung a can from a branch by a long piece of fishing line, so that John could learn how to shoot a moving target.

He moved on from the air pistol, to rifles, to his father’s .38.

John loved guns. He loved learning to load them and clean them, loved the way his father stood behind him to correct his stance. He loved the way the bullets went into their slots, onetwothreefourfivesix. Loved the feel of the metal against his small hands. He loved the way his father nodded with satisfaction after he’d hit the bull’s eye, hit the can, and the way that night at dinner his mother would look at them both and mutter under her breath about boys and their toys.

But then, at that age, guns were not weapons. They weren’t toys, either; he’d had that drilled into his head from the first time he’d ever _seen_ a gun, and begged his father to let him hold it. And from the first time he’d held his own Crossman 1300 Medalist, that wonderful little air pistol that was his and his alone, he’d promised his parents that he’d always be responsible, never forget it was a _gun_.

He went on to win blue ribbons and trophies, which went up on the mantle along with his bronzed baby shoes and the picture of him with nothing on but a diaper and chocolate cake. Shooting at targets and hitting them dead on was natural, and John had always had an aptitude for it. It helped that he loved it – the mechanics, the accuracy involved, the way he was the _best_ at it. He’d had friends whose parents wouldn’t let them even look at a gun, who refused to even own one. They seemed to think he was some kind of superhero when they saw the mantle, or when he told them about the tournament at summer camp where he beat out _everyone_ and got the most points for his cabin.

It was something that made John feel unique, and special, and shooting was something he could always remember and say, “Hey, I’m good at that.” Guns beat out everything, even go-carts and the dream of flying, for the number one place in his heart.

Until, that is, the first time he used a gun to _kill_.

John doesn’t love guns anymore. He carries because he has to, and because that’s who and what he is. He still goes to target practice because he needs to, so he can keep sharp and protect his team. His city. But hitting a target shaped like a person is different from hitting a target that’s just circles, and shooting a Wraith – or a man – running at him is different from hitting the aluminum of that first moving target swinging in the summer breeze.

Now, guns are still not weapons. He is the weapon. He is a crack shot, can assemble and use every damned piece of firepower the USAF or Pegasus galaxy has ever shoved into his hands. He can kill. Does kill. It isn’t all he is. He knows this. Knows he is more than commander and pilot and killer. But sometimes, the fact that he is a weapon blots out everything else, and he wishes he could go back to when guns were just something cool to do, and being the best damned shot around only meant a trophy and his picture in the paper.

**Author's Note:**

> [podfic by reena_jenkins found here](http://reena-jenkins.dreamwidth.org/382814.html)


End file.
